Shinohara Returns
by kagakiri
Summary: Set in an AU where BOS Chapter 8 never happened, 5 years after the Kisaragi kids' escape from Heavenly Host a now 14-year-old Yuu Shinohara is convinced by his friends to join in on the Sachiko Ever After charm, inevitably leading to them becoming trapped within the school. But as he navigates the corridors Yuu feels a strange yet familiar prescence following him...
1. Chapter 1

For the past 7 years of his life, Yuu Shinohara had always been the most responsible person he knew. Ever since the disappearance of his mother when he was just 7 years old, as the oldest sibling he had been forced to take on a parental role within the family in order to help his father care for his still tiny siblings. Even now little had changed. Kei may have been ready to start his first year of junior high and Aya's tenth birthday was just around the corner, yet to Yuu they were still the tiny, helpless children he had taken care of all those years ago. As a result he was constantly worrying about how they were, demanding that Kei kept a close eye on Aya whenever they went out without him. They laughed at him now – he didn't need to worry about them anymore, it's not like _you're_ a grown-up either, they always said – but he had become so protective of them that he could barely go to school without texting Kei to make sure he was okay.

His friends had noticed this as well – whilst certainly not unpopular within his class, Yuu had a reputation for being uptight and mature. He was the class representative, having been the only person who had actually volunteered for it, and took his role quite seriously, being used to having a position of authority for most of his life. Whenever anybody chose to do anything remotely risky, he would reprimand them instantly, sometimes appearing almost out of nowhere to yell at them to stop. This usually only resulted in him being laughed at, left to blush in humiliation and retreat.

It was after another of these incidents, on a cool February afternoon, that he had dramatically pulled back his chair and stuck out his bottom lip in irritation, staring at the blackboard.

'Don't get hung up about it, Yuu.' Ayaka Tachibana, one of his two best friends, came and knelt next to his desk, giving him a playful slap on the back.

'See, even you find it funny,' he grumbled, glaring at her sulkily. 'It's not funny though, is it? I'm just trying to help.'

'We know, we know.' She nodded sagely as she grabbed the side of Yuu's desk to support herself getting up. 'Honestly, it's fine! Nobody's judging you, they're just having a bit of fun. That's all.'

'If you're sure,' he sighed, following suit as he pushed his chair underneath the desk. 'Are you going straight home today?'

'Well, I was gonna, but Naoki said he wanted to meet in the club room. So that's where I'm going. He said to bring you if I saw you, too. And here we are.'

'Which club does Naoki do again?'

'Art. You need to get anything before we go?'

'No, I'm good. Did Naoki say why he wanted to meet us?'

'Nope! I'm just as in the dark as you. Come on, let's go!'

They continued their casual conversation as they strolled down the hallways of Nishiji Junior High School, Ayaka occasionally stopping to examine any flyers stuck to the walls that caught her interest. It was nothing more than small talk really, but Yuu had always felt comfortable talking to Ayaka. Really, they didn't need the polite courtesy of small talk – Ayaka herself was very easy to talk to, and once Yuu became comfortable around people he became a lot more relaxed in personality. They continued to exchange pleasantries until they happened upon the classroom that was used as the art club, Ayaka taking a little excited hop before she twisted the handle.

'Oh, finally!' Naoki exclaimed, turning to face them. 'I thought you guys weren't gonna come. You found Yuu then, huh?'

'Yep!' Ayaka nodded cheerfully. 'Don't worry, we wouldn't blow you off like that. What's with the big deal, anyway? Where are all the easels?'

'We're not painting today,' Naoki shrugged, tucking a strand of his black hair behind one ear. 'Couldn't be bothered. Actually, if you really wanna know the secrets of the art club, I can now officially reveal that we can't be bothered most days. It's fine. Anyway, I'll let Hana take it from here. She's the one who thought of this, right?'

Yuu turned towards the tall, lanky girl stood in the corner of the room, her eyebrows hidden by her long, thick fringe. Her hair was bleached, giving the impression that she was some kind of delinquent or gyaru, but Yuu knew better. This was Hana Kawaguchi, a remarkably ordinary girl from class 2-C. She and Yuu only spoke infrequently, but from their conversations she had failed to make much of an impression on him. Whilst Yuu tried not to be the type to judge people on personality traits that didn't hurt anyone, he had always found Hana to just be so… boring. Unlike Ayaka, he had never been able to get past small talk with her, their discussions consisting almost entirely of conversation about the weather, school, or how tired they were. He didn't even know she was a member of the art club – Naoki had never seen fit to tell him.

Hana gave a little wave, the corner of her mouth raising slightly. 'Um, well, okay. Basically, I found this charm on the internet from some paranormal blog. It was about 5 years old, but I figured that there's no reason why it can't still work. I thought it sounded nice, anyway… It's a charm that's meant to keep everyone who takes part together forever. What you do, basically, you get a paper doll – don't worry, I printed one out already - and you all hold it in your hands. Everyone has to say "Sachiko, we beg of you" in their heads once for each person who's there, and-'

'"Sachiko, we beg of you"?' Ayaka cut her off sharply. 'Who's Sachiko? Come on, Kawaguchi, you have to give us some context here.'

'I don't know,' Hana replied, an irritated edge to her tone. 'The spirit that we're praying to, I'm guessing. Anyway! After you've performed the chant, everyone has to pull as hard as they can until the paper doll rips into pieces. The scrap you get left over is your charm. Keep it on you and you'll always be together. That's the gist of it.'

'Huh, whatever. Sure, I'm down,' Ayaka shrugged nonchalantly, though the curl of her lip betrayed her true thoughts. 'How many of us have we got? Ten?'

Yuu's eyes darted around the room to count. There was him, Ayaka, Naoki, Hana, a tiny first-year boy whose name he didn't know, his senpai Minako Koizumi, another first-year girl whose name he didn't know, 2-D (Yuu's class)'s class clown Daisuke Inoue, Manami Miyamoto whose name was the only thing he knew about her, and Itsuki Ueda, another senpai of his who, if he remembered correctly, was Koizumi's girlfriend. Yuu didn't see why he would particularly _want_ to be 'together forever' with any of these people, Naoki, Ayaka and maybe Daisuke aside, but he figured it would be a little mean to just walk out on Hana. It would look bad in front of Naoki, too, although Ayaka seemed just as unenthusiastic as Yuu.

'Ten,' Yuu nodded. 'Well, I'm ready when you are.'

'Now's as good as time as any,' Hana smiled, producing the paper doll from a desk. 'Now, everybody stand in a circle and hold the doll in one hand. Is everybody good?'

A chorus of 'yes's arose from the circle, and Hana continued on.

'Okay. Now, when I say go, in your head chant "Sachiko, we beg of you" ten times. If you mess one up just keep going or the charm won't work. Exactly ten times. Okay? Go!'

A silence fell on the classroom as everybody got to work. Yuu made sure to count ten times exactly, though he didn't really see what difference it made. What's the spirit going to do? Magically read my mind? Yuu didn't even believe in spirits and folklore, and even if he did, he had never heard about telepathy being one of the powers bestowed to the dead.

Hana slowly raised her eyes. 'Everyone done it?'

The chorus of 'yes's arose again, though this time most were hushed whispers.

'Right then. One the count of three…! One… two… three!'

Everyone pulled back, Yuu doing so with more strength than he had expected, as by pulling back on the doll he had also managed to elbow himself in the stomach. Rubbing it gently, he examined the paper scrap for a few brief seconds before sticking it in his jacket pocket. That would probably never see the light of day again.

'Yuu, did you hit yourself?' Naoki smirked, holding back a laugh. 'You okay?'

'Yeah, I'm fine,' Yuu replied, a laugh beginning to rise up from his own throat. That was another change that Yuu always felt around his friends: an ability to actually laugh at himself. Whenever other people laughed at him, he always got self-conscious and nervous, but Ayaka and Naoki were somehow always able to make him see the funny side of a situation. 'Can anyone else feel the floor shaking?'

'Yeah, I can too,' the first-year girl said, studying the floor. 'Oh, it's getting faster-'

'I can definitely feel it now,' Itsuki chimed in, his lips pursed. 'Do you think it might be an earthquake? Shouldn't we get somewhere safe?'

'Like where?'

'I don't know, what are you meant to do in earthquakes?'

'Under the table! Just get under there for now.'

But in their scramble for the tables there was a loud thump followed by a sickening crunch. Yuu tilted his head back to see Manami lying at an odd angle on the floor, wincing and clutching her arm in pain. But his attention was only able to focus on her for a couple of seconds as he noticed what had just caused her to fall.

'What the hell…? Did the floor just fall away?'

Indistinguishable screams rang out as they all staggered backwards, nobody seeming to want to offer Manami any help. Gasping, she attempted to stand up before suddenly staggering backwards and – _and…_

'Miyamoto!' Ayaka screeched, her eyes bulging. 'Miyamoto! Miyamoto! She just fell down the hole! Did you guys just _see_ that? She fell! What do we do what do we –'

She was cut off, caught quite by surprise, as the hole in the floor was rapidly beginning to expand. Before she could say anything else Yuu noticed she was teetering on the very edge of floor, poised to fall at any minute.

'Ayaka!' he screamed, grabbing out to reach her – but in what felt like only a split second she had lost her balance and fell through the hole, her screams fading worryingly quickly. Why were they fading? Shouldn't she have just hit the first floor? Wait, this hole didn't look like the first floor at all! It was just a black void! Now that he thought about it, where had Daisuke, Itsuki and Minako gone? His mind overflowed with an ugly mixture of confusion and horror, and as he backed up to the wall he realized that the hole was not going to stop.

_Am I… really going to die here?_

The question seemed to have no weight to it, as if the whole situation was just a bad dream. The pit of Yuu's stomach did not feel heavy, though he was beginning to shudder. The concept of dying here just felt like something hypothetical. It wasn't actually going to happen, right? Right? He'd wake up in a minute, and then he'd tell Ayaka and Naoki the next morning and Ayaka would laugh at him whilst Naoki looked up what it symbolized. Everything would be fine.

'Yuu, I-!'

He was only snapped back to his senses by a cry from Naoki. Yuu only had a split second to process what was going on before Naoki's fingers slowly began to slip from the edge he had a hold of before he fell down into the dark abyss below. He was still shouting something, but Yuu's mind had gone too blank to register anything he had said. He had climbed on top of one of the desks in the very corner of the room, despite having inside resigned himself to the fact that the situation was hopeless. The hole would get bigger and eventually swallow up the desk, too.

And take him with it.


	2. Chapter 2

In a surprising yet pleasant twist of fate, Yuu didn't die. His head was pounding, his joints ached and he had absolutely no idea where he was, but at the very least he was alive. And the face of Hana Kawaguchi was staring back at him.

'Shinohara…? Are you awake?'

Yuu felt his vision sharpening as he began to come back to his senses, rubbing his temple in a futile attempt to ease the pain. 'Kawaguchi? Is that you?'

'Um, yeah, it's me.' Hana bit her lip awkwardly before looking back at him. 'You've been out for about 5 minutes… well, I mean later than me. Maybe I was out too for a while… I really don't know. Are you okay?'

Yuu nodded blankly, his brain too overloaded with trying to process what had just happened to speak. Where the hell had he landed…? It was pretty dark in here, so it was hard to really see the details. The room was illuminated by a few overhead lights, but their light was dim and they flickered erratically. Yuu wouldn't be surprised if they suddenly went out altogether.

There was an awkward pause before Hana finally outstretched a hand to help Yuu up. He accepted her offer, slowly getting to his feet, though he lurched forward as the vertigo began to kick in. Hana grabbed his shoulders in an attempt to steady him, her brow furrowed in concern.

'Are you _sure_ you're okay? You seem pretty dazed.'

'I'm fine, honestly,' Yuu insisted, taking a deep breath. 'That doesn't matter right now, anyway. Where are we? And where are the others?'

'I can't answer either of those,' Hana sighed, her arms folded. 'This place looks like a classroom, but definitely not one from Nishiji. It's pitch black out, too, which doesn't make any sense…'

'I guess we must have been out for a pretty long time then,' Yuu mused, finally examining the room thoroughly. Hana was right – this was definitely a classroom, but where? The walls were dusty and covered in cracks and parts of the floorboards had begun to fall away. Wherever they were, this place had to be disused by now. Maybe they'd somehow managed to make it into a really old classroom…?

'Don't you think these desks look a little, well, small?' Hana muttered, studying them. 'Like… the kind you'd get in elementary school.'

'Well, we can't be at the elementary school,' Yuu snapped. 'That's 15 minutes away. They're probably just small desks.'

For a split second Yuu thought he saw a scowl flash across Hana's face, but this was quickly replaced by a frown. 'No, I'm serious. You can't seriously expect a junior high student to fit into one of these chairs, can you?'

Yuu sighed. He guessed there was no point in arguing with Hana. 'Well, maybe they are, maybe they aren't. That doesn't really matter now though, right? What we need to do is find the others and then a way out of here. If this is a school then it can't exactly be difficult.'

He turned to look at Hana, only to find her staring up at the ceiling with her jaw wide open. 'Kawaguchi? What's up?'

'Shinohara… l-look…'

Yuu glanced up at the ceiling and suddenly realized what she was so shocked about.

It was completely unscathed.

_How?_ was the only word that came to Yuu's mind. This just defied all logic and reason. They had been in the earthquake and fallen through a hole in the floor. That, at least, was still clear in his memories. But… if there was no hole in the ceiling… then how had they managed to end up in here? Had they fallen somewhere else and been carried here? But who would have done that, and why? And why was it so dark out if it wasn't even four o'clock when the earthquake happened? Yuu's thoughts were swimming with questions that had no answers. And even amidst all his confusion, there was still one thing that took priority over everything else.

_What about Kei and Aya?_

The thought of his siblings only sent a new jolt of pain through him. What were they doing now?

_Oh God, I was meant to pick them up from school! Where are they now? What if they're still there waiting for me even in the dark? What if Dad's worried sick about us all because we're nowhere to be found? What if Kei's let Aya out of his sight and she's gone wandering off somewhere? What if-_

'Okay, okay,' Hana breathed, her head in her hands. 'It's okay. We're okay. I know it seems crazy but I'm sure there's a totally logical explanation for this somewhere. We'll just find the others and then a way out, like you said.' She shook her head rapidly, sending her blonde hair flying. 'Yep. Yep! I'm okay, it's okay. Come on, Shinohara, we need to move. I'll lead the way if you want.'

'Y-y-yeah,' Yuu stuttered, staring blankly at her. '…Let's go.'

They slowly edged their way toward the door of the classroom, neither seeming particularly willing to turn the handle. After what seemed like forever, Hana finally let out a sigh and shoved the door open, striding into the corridor.

It was just as dimly lit as the classroom had been, although the lights didn't seem to flicker so much this time round. The walls and floor were in just as bad a state, however, and in one end of hall there was even a large gap in the floorboards that Yuu didn't particularly want to attempt crossing. On the other side of the classroom was a downwards staircase, with the light of a small candle flickering from within.

'I guess that's our only choice for now,' Hana sighed. 'What's with that candle?'

It certainly was strange. Both of them had already begun to work out the implications of this decidedly out-of-place item. Someone else must have been here before them – recently, as it was still lit.

'What time is it, anyway?' Yuu wondered aloud, grabbing his phone from his blazer pocket. Studying the display, it said it was 13:27.

'Well,_ that's_ obviously wrong,' Hana muttered, peering over his shoulder. 'Ugh, and no signal. I don't have my phone on me right now, so I guess we're stuck without a way to contact anyone.' She threw her head back and groaned. 'God, this is so annoying…'

'It'll be fine,' Yuu replied sternly. 'Everything's gonna be okay. We just need to stay close to each other and make sure we don't leave a single stone unturned. If possible we should find something to get across that gap in the corridor with, in case someone managed to end up on that side. Okay, Kawaguchi?'

Hana frowned. 'Fine. But don't talk down to me like I'm your little sister or something. It's patronizing.'

'O-oh, come on, I wasn't! Sorry if I offended you, alright? Now can we just go?'

They continued on in an awkward silence, their footsteps the only sound they could hear. As they approached the staircase, Hana knelt down to examine the candle.

'This is really weird too,' she mumbled, peering at it. 'The wax doesn't look melted at all.'

'Then doesn't that mean it was only just lit?' Yuu gasped. 'Kawaguchi, this is great news! It means one of the others was probably just around here!'

'No…' Hana frowned, biting her lip. 'You'd have thought it would've at least melted a little bit in the time it took us to walk here, right? But there isn't even a tiny pool around the wick. If I'm right…' She took a deep breath and quickly tapped the wax. 'Oh, thank God. It's cold.'

Yuu stared at her in bemusement. 'But that makes no sense. How can it be burning?'

'I dunno… I'd say it was artificial, but that flame looks pretty real. I guess we'll never know.'

'_I guess we'll never know'? Isn't that a little too convenient? _Yuu thought to himself, eyeing Hana suspiciously. He didn't want to spend _too_ long dwelling on it, but it definitely seemed significant to him. Despite his doubts, he really didn't have the energy to argue with Hana over this and was more keen on just finding a way out already than debating the laws of physics.

They continued down the stairs, into another corridor with several large gaps all across it. Hana and Yuu walked through in single file, careful to keep as far away from the edges as possible. There was an odd atmosphere to this corridor – neither could exactly put their finger on what it was, but it was enough to cause a shiver of tension tingling down Yuu's spine.

Before long they reached the centre of the hallway. They stopped for a second, taken aback by the number of shoes strewn across the floor. Yuu couldn't possibly have counted how many – there must have been at least 20 pairs there.

Hana knelt down to examine them. 'Okay, Shinohara, I know it sounded really stupid before, but… there is no way these can belong to anybody older than 11. Seriously. These are kid's shoes.'

'It's probably just a coincidence,' Yuu muttered, not looking her in the eye. 'You're just paranoid.'

'I'm not paranoid!' Hana yelled, clutching her shirt at her chest. 'I'm telling you, Shinohara, I know what I saw! _These are kid's shoes! Take a look if you don't believe me! Will that satisfy you?'_

'Okay, okay, just calm down,' Yuu began, not entirely sure what to do. Did he give her a reassuring pat on the back? No, that would be too familiar. A hug was out of the question. Instead he opted for raising his eyebrows expectantly at her, which only seemed to irritate her further. 'Look, this is good news, isn't it? If there are shoes scattered around here, we might be near a cloakroom, which would be near the exit. Right?'

Hana looked at him with a sour expression, though she appeared to consider what he had just said. 'Yep. Fine. Okay. Let's keep moving. I'm serious, though, Shinohara. We can't just ignore this.'

They turned left at the first junction in the corridor, leading to a large cloakroom just as Yuu had predicted. It was filled with shoe lockers, all of which were empty with the exception of one, which had tens of pairs stuffed haphazardly within. The remaining shoes were strewn across the floor, just as they had been outside.

'See, I told you,' Yuu smiled slightly, the hammering in his chest finally beginning to slow. 'We're nearly there now. Then we can get out of here at last.'

'Fair enough, you were right.' The corners of Hana's mouth were twitching, as though she were trying to hide her relief. 'Look, there's some double doors over there. Should be our ticket out of here.' She strode over to them, a bounce in her step, and began to tug on the handles.

The hammering in Yuu's chest quickly picked back up again. Hana tugged and tugged, but nothing happened. There wasn't even a rattling noise to signify that the door was locked. If the handles hadn't been there, Yuu would probably have assumed that it was nothing more than a painting on the wall.

'You know that's not going to work, right?'

Hana's hands froze in place on the handles as she slowly tilted her head around. Yuu felt his blood run cold, being also compelled to look behind him but at the same time terrified of what he might see. The voice was female – it had a very different quality to Hana's, it couldn't possibly be hers – and had an almost strange echoing quality to it. It was just the acoustics in this place, wasn't it? That was all. Right?

Hana's face was paralyzed in an expression of horrified fear. She said nothing, but her eyes slowly moved from the owner of the voice to Yuu, then back to the owner of the voice. Steeling himself, though feeling his stomach gradually begin to knot, he slowly turned around.

A tiny blue spirit awaited him.


End file.
